As Brooks and many others have correctly pointed out, the key to Kennedy’s legislative achievements was his willingness to move forward gradually. It’s been reported almost everywhere that his greatest regret was his decision to reject President Nixon’s health care reform package because it was not sufficiently ambitious. But Kennedy realized over the years that working with Nixon would have led to significant advancements toward his larger goals.

Fast forward to today’s battles over health care, and it’s clear that a bill that addresses the areas on which common agreement already exists would constitute a major step forward. Neither party would achieve all their top priorities, but legislation that allows individuals who change jobs to keep their insurance, forbids the denial of coverage for pre-existing conditions, and deals with a lifetime cap on benefits would constitute an extraordinary achievement.

Kennedy’s lesson is that it’s better to be a mile outside of hell heading out. Political leaders of both parties can apply that lesson and understand that important progress can be made on health care right now, and that after the most important health care reforms in a generation are signed into law, they can still come back to the negotiating table and pick up where they left off.

One of the chief obstacles to building the kind of bipartisan consensus that Senator Kennedy used so effectively is, it seems, is the growing sense of moral superiority and belief in the purity of one's own views. The Almighty didn't give either party a monopoly on good ideas or programs, much less absolute moral rectitude.

It's harder than ever today to find that sentiment that Kennedy embodied and lived: The possibility that your fiercest political adversary can love his country just as much as you do ­ which provides a commonality of spirit that paves the way for meaningful accomplishments.

Ted Kennedy was the ultimate politician of principle, a title owing much to his family's tradition and--in the context of today's dogfighting on the Hill--to the fact that his Senate seat was never threatened. He could afford to live for his goals, not just to play the game. This liberated Kennedy to cooperate with Republicans on shared goals and to play down differences over the means of achieving them.

However, most congressional Democrats too frequently lose sight of their goals, not to mention common ground that they might have with Republicans, by insisting they be pursued only through heavy-handed governmental means and the protection of their money machine special interests, like public employee unions (quite distinguishable from private sector unions in my view) and the tort bar. This has frustrated many Republicans who also don't have to worry about being elected, including this one, who are more ambitious than optimistic about what the two parties might accomplish together.

When Kennedy entered the Senate, Richard Russell, the southern powerhouse, told him that “you go further if you go slow.” This was a lesson that Kennedy took to heart, particularly after the conservative movement took power in Washington. From the 1980s through recent years, Kennedy learned to fight for big ideas one bill at a time.

What made him different than other legislators who pride themselves on the art of compromise, however, was that Kennedy retained a broader commitment and ideological outlook about government. He was an unreconstructed liberal who was determined to fight for health care, civil rights, and social justice. When Kennedy made a deal with Republicans, he would come back the next year to fight for more. It was the second part of the equation that is crucial to understanding his legislative style. This is why the most ardent liberals respected him so much at the same time that Republican colleagues can now appreciate his role as a deal-maker.

Ted Kennedy was effective because it was never personal. It was never about egos. It was about principles. He found common ground because he was not out to win for the sake of winning; he was in search of help for the people he felt called upon to serve.

Certainly he delivered services of value to his constituents in Massachusetts and to his party. But his mission in life was to lift up all Americans, especially those in danger of being left behind. A purpose larger than oneself, larger than remaining ideologically pure, larger than defending partisan turf, larger than winning re-election – all that provides moral authority that can encourage others to join the cause.

Perhaps because he never won the Presidential nomination in 1970, or perhaps because he fumbled the question in that election season about why he was running for President, he found in the years that followed a greater determination to live up to the Kennedy name. This was all about legacy, not dynasty. He extended the values of his brother’s Presidency from the 1960 election to the 2008 election and beyond – from dealing with poverty to children’s health insurance and an aspiration to educate every schoolchild, from civil rights to the election of the first African-American President, and from the Peace Corps to AmeriCorps. (It is fitting that red-jacketed City Year corps members, the model for AmeriCorps, guided visitors at his casket at the John F. Kennedy Library; Ted Kennedy was called the father of national service.) The ideals that President John F. Kennedy stood for lived on through his Senator brother, who in a certain respect completed the unfinished Kennedy Presidency.

A sense of history, a concern for legacy and intergenerational continuity, and a higher purpose are all assets for those who want to be effective leaders who get things done across partisan divides. Ideological purity works only for talk show hosts. For true leaders, what matters is the ability to identify areas of agreement that transcend differences and make progress, even in small increments.

Senator Kennedy was dogged in his work. Yet patience and keen political radar enabled the “common ground” political achievements that carry his name. He leveraged his strong relationships with members in both parties when he sensed an opportunity to advance his legislative goals – albeit incrementally. Senator Kennedy’s political maturity and pragmatism is a lesson in political leadership.

His pragmatism made him no less passionate about achieving his goals and policy agenda. He kept coming back to fight for more. And a lot of this “more” I disagreed with in our advocacy efforts for small business. But how could you not admire someone with such work ethic and passion? People like working with individuals that have these qualities. The work of our political leaders needs to be less “about them” as Senator Kennedy so demonstrated throughout his career.

Senator Kennedy was an effective legislator--never mind for a moment whether one agreed with much of the legislation he sponsored--by building personal relationships, using the Kennedy name and charisma to attract allies on both sides of the aisle, being a tough-minded partisan who would look out for his political interests but at the same time ensuring that his conflicts with Republicans never became personal, looking for Republican support whenever he could, having an excellent staff, and working to master the legislation after some years of being a senatorial dilettante.

Except for being able to trade on the Kennedy name and charisma, there is no reason on Earth why other legislators cannot apply some, most, or all of the tricks of the trade employed by Senator Kennedy to be effective legislators themselves.

Common ground is rooted in mutual respect: for starters, grant each side their heroes. Just as Ronald Reagan's passing moved Bil Kristol to propose "someone should say at the Republican convention, 'Win one more for the Gipper.

Win one more for the Gipper' [JUNE 13, 2004 FOX News Sunday], Ted Kennedy's passing moves many progressives to pass healthcare reform and "win one for Teddy." Nothing wrong with granting people their political heroes or exhorting them to pick up the ideological mantle of a fallen leader. Second, offer media bandwidth to those who actually do find common ground. What is the currency of the realm? If it's attention based upon drama - then like any reality show viewer can tell you, you'll get drama. If it's attention based upon common ground, then you might see more evidence of cooperation. I renew the call posted yesterday: Politico.com and our other media outlets could help change the sensationalist culture - run a success of the week heralding some significant point of dialogue; elevate progress among unlikely allies; give some bandwidth to celebrate the successes which far outweigh the failures of American democracy.

Not everything is a crisis, but if watch television news you would think so.

One of the problems about patience and finding common ground in politics and government is that every problem America faces is turned into a crisis. When politicians hear crisis they think they have to act immediately or else the Republic itself will collapse.

And once that happens the ones in power scramble to "solve" the crisis and the ones out of power offer their own "solution" which is completely the opposite of what the other side is saying with usually not much common ground between them.

Then the media takes over and 24/7 tells us about the impending doom if we don't act. We work ourselves into a lather, left hollerin' at right and vice versa, and then the political consultants take over and create mini-campaigns to push their side of the argument-TV ads, polling, direct mail, robocalls and all the stuff that goes into campaigns. We turn a public policy issue into a battle instead of a debate with different points of view.

Problems remain unsolved as both parties jockey for position and they only can see as far as the next election. Voters also see both parties using wedge issues which have nothing to do with tackling the tough issues and are only meant to divide the electorate. And we wonder why we have the political polarization that we do.

I also believe that the political class believes that every issue or problem has a legislative solution. Some things just have to work themselves out over time.

And that requires patience from both the people and their elected representatives.

Two parts of the Cowboy's Libertarian's Code say.

"Life has isn't fair and it isn't the responsibility of the government to make it so."

"Life has risk. We can't litigate, legislate or regulate our way out of every problem."

Maybe if we thought more like this we would be more patient and find common ground instead of jumping from "crisis to crisis".

Serving half of his career during a conservative era, Senator Kennedy came to see that incrementalism was not a virtue but the mother of necessity. If he could have helped pass universal health care in one fell swoop in the 1970s when he accused President Carter of balking on it, he would have.

Too, his discovery about incrementalism wasn't just a sound legislative approach. He also had the absolute luxury to take the long institutional and legislative view, to see legislation in parts and not wholes. Why? Because he never faced more than a minor scare for re-election. For nearly fifty years, Ted Kennedy knew with little doubt that he would be the senior senator from Massachusetts. With little doubt, he understood that he would be back after the next election cycle (I believe that, after his first election, he never won with less than 55% of the vote--someone can correct me on that). That kind of confidence lets you, for example, spend ten years passing a less-than-desired amount for a minimum wage increase and then submitting legislation for another increase the very day after the first one was signed into law. When you know you'll be back to fight another day, you do just that.

Presidents do not operate under the same luxurious timeline, obviously. You can see why they feel pressured to act boldly and enact grand bargains. President Clinton surely learned in his second term that small is both effective government and also popular with the electorate. Other presidents have too--Nixon comes to mind.

So as we praise incrementalism--and let's remember that ground-breaking tax cuts that redistribute wealth upward such as the Bush tax cuts of 00's and earlier the Reagan tax cuts of 80s are not examples of incrementalism--let us put a fat stake in the heart of the idea of term limits. At the old proposed rate of senators serving no more than twelve years, Ted Kennedy's two terms of office would have ended in 1974! On the other hand, his Senate institutional memory, knowledge, know-how, and doggedness contributed to passing more than 2,500 pieces of liberal legislation that continue to have an influential impact on people in the country of every age, race, class, and calling.

To further elaborate on Steve's point, according to newly-released data from the IRS, the top 1 percent of taxpayers in 2007 paid 40.4 percent of all federal income taxes, while the bottom 95 percent of taxpayers paid 39.4 percent. Despite the Bush 2001 and 2003 tax rate cuts, the tax code remains highly progressive. It could be argued that President John F. Kennedy's tax rate cuts every bit as beneficial to the so-called wealthy as the Reagan and Bush tax cuts. But Kennedy understood that lower marginal tax rates were the best way to promote economic prosperity. My favorite JFK quote: "It is a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high and tax revenues are too low and the soundest way to raise the revenues in the long run is to cut the rates now ... Cutting taxes now is not to incur a budget deficit, but to achieve the more prosperous, expanding economy which can bring a budget surplus."

Good to hear from you, Cesar. It's been a delightful but misleading tactic for decades to use President Kennedy's early 1960s tax cuts against progressives. However, his tax cuts weren't supply-side cuts that favored business investment as a catalyst for growth--that is, where the government redistributes money to the wealthy and businesses to invest.

Instead, they were demand-side cuts that float money back to the public as a temporary measure in the hope that they'll spend it and not use it to pay down debt. In other words, as supply-side is to Milton Friedman, demand-side is to J. M. Keynes. Plus, they were cuts built on a budgetary comfort with running a deficit. (Two historic side notes. Business leaders opposed Kennedy's tax cut proposal. And: President Kennedy is on record for saying that he'd go the tax cut route first, but only as a prelude to initiate what he called an "expenditures program.") Signed into law by President Johnson in 1964 (I believe), Kennedy's tax cuts cut tax-withholding rates, created a new standard deduction, and raised deductions for child care. As for the top tax bracket: It was cut a lot, but from a much higher starting point than we've ever experienced since the Reagan era. Kennedy cut taxes from 91% to 70% on families earning over $400,000 in 1960s dollars. But there's another way to put the issue: In the area of taxation--asin many other liberal legislative achievements, Jack Kennedy was no Ted Kennedy.

David, after reading your response to Steve, I skimmed over my pocket-sized version of the U.S. Constitution, but couldn’t find the part where it says the Federal government’s role is “to monitor and adjust obscene inequalities.” Perhaps I missed it? In any event, on your alarm about rising incomes of the top 1 percent of American taxpayers: if you review the data, what is most striking is the sharp rise in the income shares of the top 1 percent during the Clinton years.

Between 1992 and 2000, the top 1 percent share of income increased from 14.23 percent to 20.81 percent, an increase of 7 percentage points, before declining in 2001 and 2002. So the rich got richer during the Clinton years, but it didn’t seem to alarm liberals very much. Perhaps you complained about it back then? In recent years under President Bush, the income tax share of the top 1 percent increased to a record 40.4 percent in 2007, and it did so at a rate much faster than the rise in their income shares. The tax code is highly progressive, which by my lights is a problem that must be addressed through fundamental tax reform (but let's leave that discussion for another day). In 2007 (the latest data available), the top 1 percent is comprised of only 1.4 million taxpayers who generated a total adjusted gross income of $2 trillion, which I’m guessing is maybe 20-30 percent less today because of the recession and stock market collapse. So if the government decided to “adjust obscene inequalities” by imposing a 100 percent tax on the top 1 percent, it would barely cover today's deficit, leaving little to pay for income redistribution programs. And by the way, at high tax rates, the rich will work, invest, and produce less, leaving fewer private sector jobs for the rest of us. This liberal notion that taxing the rich will cure all economic and societal ills is a fraud.

David, in the spirit of both bipartisanship and accuracy, I hope we can agree that the Bush and Reagan tax cuts, which had much in common with the top-rate tax cuts by Ted Kennedy's brother John, did not (as you imply) lower taxes for the wealthy and then redistribute the tax burden to the rest of us. If you review the data you'll see that within a few years after all three sets of tax cuts, the wealthiest Americans paid considerably more taxes (in inflation-adjusted terms) than before and the poorer paid proportionately less. It will surely help us to start the dialogue with agreement on the facts.

Thanks for the nod, Steve. Good to hear from you. I was grateful for your reminiscences on Senator Kennedy's death the other day. As for facts, I got these for our bipartisan table about income inequality. From 1986-2005, the average tax rate for the wealthiest 1% of Americans declined from around 35% to roughly 25%. In the same period, as you say, their adjusted share of the income tax burden rose about 10%. But, all along, their burden of taxation could not keep pace even with their rising share of income. That is, the wealthiest 1% earned the highest share of the nation's adjusted gross income--that share, almost 25%, was the highest since (and this date should ring a nasty bell) 1929.

Now, in the spirit of fact-sharing, these gains are not only from the upward redistribution I made mention of. Some are from friendlier trade policies, the effects of globalization, and IRS rules shifting reporting from individuals to, say, partnerships. But even those three--no, I won't say corporate welfare--but wealthy 1% favorability effects (to coin a clunky phrase) are part of government's redistribution of wealth. And just to be clear, my faith is the government ought to be a catalyst for the common good-- for both the downtrodden and the rich. But it's also government's role to monitor and adjust obscene inequalities. And those tax cuts didn't cause--to return to today's Arena topic--incremental change. Plus, the burden of the latest tax cuts has cost the government about $2 trillion in revenue (and I can't go without saying that the war in Iraq has cost nearly $1 trillion). So you're correct about the tax issue as you've defined it. It is one item in a tapestry of facts about wealth, income inequality, and government taxation, debt, deficit, and spending as it relates to personal incomes.

It appears that some Democrats haven't learned any lessons about "patience and common ground" when they immediately suggested naming the public insurance option in the health care reform bill after Sen. Ted Kennedy. While I can certainly understand the "win one for Teddy" sentiment, the naming the controversial bill after the deceased Liberal Lion is a blatant political attempt by some Democrats to dress up a flawed bill so that it can be rammed through the Congress on a party-line vote this Fall. This ploy certainly won't produce "common ground" with Republicans, nor will it change public support for the bill, which has declined to a new low of 42 percent, according to a newRasmussen poll.

Leadership requires the understanding of what is possible, what is probable and what is untenable. So much of governing revolves around knowing the mood of the country and the timing of change.

Sheer power alone will not carry the day, if the People are not with you. Generational changes require leaders to find common ground beyond their own Members. It also requires patience and tenacity. Today, we have become a nation of "momentarians". We live for the moment, instead of providing for the present and planning for our futures. We are unwilling to sacrifice and demand entitlements instead of working hard and achieving. In order for our Nation to retain our greatness, our leaders must find the common ground of purpose above politics. Good governing is good politics. I believe common ground and compromise is possible and most importantly necessary. All we need are the right leaders and a willingness. We today seem to be lacking both.

Brooks' NYT column is great.Gradualism is indeed the secret of American success. As an economist, I think a great illustration of gradualism is how even bad recessions and extreme booms are fluctuations around a trend line of our average incomes increasing 2 percent a year -- a stable trend now for two centuries!

But I worry some might conclude that gradualism is the province of conservatives and the opposite of liberalism. Wrong: Bush and the neocons were some of the worst anti-gradualists in our history. There are liberal gradualists (as Kennedy became) and conservative gradualists. Together they produce the 2 percent trend, while the American public only briefly tolerates and then firmly rejects the anti-gradualists.

I very much appreciate the idea that there is common ground. Reforming the financial system, for example, and foreign policy both lend themselves to this thought. On the other hand, I am not a big fan of 'a plague on both their houses' thinking and false equivalence when one side is more resistant to cooperation than the other

. In this case, it happens to be Republicans, driven by minority status (although were the situation reversed it might well be the Democrats - nothing intrinsic to either party.) So, wherever that common ground can be found, efforts to deal should be made. In the absence of genuine effort in the Senate (the House is another matter), partisan legislation will prevail. But don't confuse the cart and the horse. Partisan legislation fills the vacuum when the minority party doesn't show up to play (see health care, where it's been stated that the GOP goal is to stop reform, not find common ground.)

Reuel Castillo (guest)
CA:

I would have to say that Colleagues of the late Senator Kennedy is this: No matter what your idealogical stripe or political affiliation, the people view Congress as a single body (maybe one with two heads named Senate and House of Representatives...). Succeed and the rest of Congress succeeds with you. Fail, and you pull both houses into your own defeat.
The most persistant critique I hear of Congress is that 'they don't do anything'. That's because partisanship is so fierce that Reds will do everything in their power to defeat Blues, and vice versa. But the fallacy in that logic is that ultimately, it was Congress as a whole that failed. That's why no matter how bad Democrat polling numbers are, Republican numbers fail to rise. Congresspersons and Senators alike can ignore this at their own peril.

Lois Squires (guest)
CA:

Senator Kennedy stated many times that Universal Health Care was his "LIFE'S WORK". What better recognition than to name this bill after him. Republicans are doing their usual two step (ala "Greatest Little Whorehouse in Texas." They seem to think that they can just say a thing and it is true. Wellstone would have welcomed the emphasis at his funeral. It was only the Republicans that had to turn it into something dirty. When you play in the mud, you're bound to get dirty. Don't play with the Republicans anymore. EMK may have talked to them and joked, but he NEVER let down his convictions.

Josh Blumenthal (guest)
NY:

In addition to an Amen, I'd like to add two comments to Patrick Dorinson's post. Mr. Dorinson wrote that "they (politicians) only can see as far as the next election." He wrote, correctly, that this is one reason for a lack of patience and a lack of effort to find common ground. It should also be said that this is likely a contributing factor to a growing disillusionment, even disenchantment, with politics and with politicians. We are not interested in their (personal) re-election and the entire primary/election process is about the candidates getting elected and not about issues and, most certainly, not about the voters. There is no honest (and civil) debate/discussion among candidates. There is only seemingly endless campaigning that lacks both civility and honor. Add to that the fact that the media exists to earn a profit for its shareholders (and NOT to serve the public) and we have the 24/7 cycle dominated by tension, crisis, drama and campaign rhetoric. Unfortunately, there are two problems with the solution (civility, honest discourse, thoughtful consideration of a larger picture). It does not sell advertising time and politicians don’t care about the long run because it comes sometime after the next election.

Jonathan Wolfman (guest)
MD:

Mr. Kennedy's achievements went well beyond health care. Aside from providing millions of poor children with health care, he forged legislation in civil rights, and in education. In 1964 he helped end the fifty-seven day southern filibuster against ending legal segregation. In 1970 his was a leading voice in extending the Voting Rights Act. He was an active supporter of voting rights for eighteen-year-olds. He opposed the Defense of Marriage Act which would set in constitutional stone the idea that gay marriage is fundamentally illegal. In 2007 he voted to reconsider the Equal Right Amendment. In 1990 he introduced the American With Disabilities Act, by common consent the most critical blow ever for disabled Americans, just one of many protections for the disabled Mr. Kennedy spearheaded. In 2001 he led senators to pass No Child left Behind, the landmark education bill. He called for robust funding of the bill despite the Bush Administration's lack of adequate funding. There are reasons to celebrate him beyond health care reform, the cause, he said so often, was the cause of his life, and we'll get that, too.

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